Hail damage scrubs at least 13 more United flights

DENVER (AP) — United Airlines canceled 13 more departures from Denver International Airport on Sunday while it inspected airplanes for damage from last week’s hailstorm.

United spokesman Mike Trevino said he didn’t know if any Sunday arrivals were canceled because of the hailstorm, which struck Wednesday. Denver International Airport’s website listed about 20 United arrivals that were canceled at one point Sunday, but it wasn’t known how many were attributed to the hailstorm.

All 13 departures canceled on Sunday were United Express regional flights, Trevino said. A 14th United Express flight was canceled for reasons unrelated to the storm, he said.

Eleven United planes remained out of service for inspection, Trevino said. He didn’t know how many were damaged.

United said it had canceled more than 100 Denver flights on Thursday and Friday because of the hail inspections.

Frontier Airlines spokesman Peter Kowalchuk said 37 of the airline’s flights were canceled Sunday, while 39 were set to be canceled on Monday and 18 were to be canceled on Tuesday.

Frontier officials were working to subservice aircraft — effectively renting planes from other airlines, Kowalchuk said. That’s one reason why there were fewer Tuesday cancellations, he said.

Southwest Airlines, another big carrier in Denver, said three of its planes were damaged by hail, but with 550 planes in its fleet, it didn’t have to delay or cancel flights.